A day out in Bristol

Before last October, I'd never been to Bristol city centre. I've been to Cribbs Causeway several times, but I'd never set foot in the actual centre of Bristol.

After venturing to Bristol for the first time and having a lovely day there with Amy last October, we decided to meet there again last week for a catch up and some shopping (and eating, obviously). Liz travelled from London to meet us for the day so it was a bit of a grand reunion! I decided to travel on the Megabus to avoid the stress of driving and parking in a new place... the bus journey cost £7.50. When you consider that the Severn bridge alone would have cost me £6.40 if I'd have driven, this was a total bargain. I even managed to have a seat to myself until we stopped in Newport!

The Megabus took an hour or so to get to Bristol and dropped me off at Colston Hall. Such a lovely building! I did get a bit lost when I attempted to find my way to Debenhams, but a very kind charity worker gave me detailed directions which put me back on track. I didn't donate any money to her charity though... I felt mildly guilty about this.

Once we'd all found each other, we decided to go straight for food. I'm glad all my friends love food as much as I do! We headed to Cabot Circus and decided to eat in Frankie and Benny's as it has good lunch deals and also has something for everyone due to its range of cuisines. I decided to be vaguely healthy and went for the penne meatballs rather than choosing something that came with chips. However, believe it or not, my decision was made in vain as the meatballs were actually served with chips. Well, I was offered a choice between chips and salad... who on earth would choose a salad when faced with those two options? Chips and pasta on the same plate isn't something I've ever experienced before, but I won't complain too much. As I've frequently mentioned on my blog, I love carbs more than any normal person should. The meatballs were really good, and the pasta, sauce and chips weren't bad either. We decided to go for dessert too as the deal was just too tempting (it would have been rude not to), so I went for the apple and cinnamon crumble with ice cream. Delicious!

After finishing our food and having a good catch up, we did some shopping. I'm busy saving for my wedding and honeymoon so I didn't buy much, but I was very pleased with the two honeymoon purchases I did decide to make. I've actually worn the earrings already as they're so beautiful, elegant and versatile, but I think the shoes will definitely be saved for our honeymoon. I don't usually wear heels but I can walk in these with no problems as they've got a strap and they're not too high. Result.

After shopping for a few hours and doing rather a lot of walking around various corners of the city centre, we simply had to stop for a drink in Costa. It was essential that I had my obligatory hot chocolate to replenish my energy levels!

As we wound down in Costa, we were already talking about the next time we'll all be together... my hen weekend in July! However, I think we'll be planning more days out in Bristol in the not too distant future. It really is a great city with lots of contrasting areas and a vast array of shops, restaurants and interesting places to wander around. It's also easy to get to and is quite a central place for us all to travel to once in a while.

Here are some photos of Bristol... might as well slot them in to back up my compliments!

I love the architecture of Cabot Circus 

Fountains!

The road leading up to Cabot Circus

Yet another area in the city centre, near where I got lost!

My bus back to Cardiff wasn't until 7pm so I had a lovely long day in Bristol. My return bus was a double decker... I've never been on a Megabus double decker before! I get excited about such simple things. I had a seat to myself for the whole journey back, and it only took about 50 minutes as we didn't stop in Newport. Great end to a great day.

Have you been to Bristol recently? What did you think? Let me know if there are any other areas of Bristol you think I should visit! 

Restaurant Review: Urban Tap House

I went to the Urban Tap House in Cardiff last Friday night on a work night out. They claim to 'serve the best burgers in Cardiff' on their website... I was very keen to verify this ambitious statement!

We got to the venue at 5:30pm and it was already pretty full. The atmosphere is very relaxed and there's no loud music so you can actually have a decent conversation. I know this makes me sound like an old lady, but I hate going to places where I have to shout to make myself heard and also have to pretend that I can hear what everyone else is saying. You know those embarrassing moments where you're just nodding along because you can't hear a word, and the other person is actually waiting for you to answer a question? I experience those moments a lot.

We congregated upstairs as there were so many of us, and we pretty much took over half the upstairs bar. The little bar upstairs has lots of rustic round tables (and dangerously high plastic chairs), and there's also a private room called the 'Cwtch'. For those of you who don't know, 'cwtch' is the lovely Welsh word for 'hug'! Coincidentally, the Urban Tap House also sells a variety of beer called 'Cwtch'.

I'd been thinking about what burger I was going to order for about three weeks, so it didn't take me too long to decide on the Big Welsh. This beast was made up of a beef burger, Welsh cheddar, bacon and pan fried leeks. The meal also came with chips and coleslaw, and cost £7.50 in total. I've never had leeks in a burger before, but no harm in trying something new!

Wow. Just wow. I loved the meal and finished every tiny little bit of it, down to the last smear of coleslaw. Yes, that purple concoction is coleslaw... some people commented that it looked like purple strips of chicken! The chips might actually have been the highlight as they were so beautifully crisp and salty, but the burger was pretty good too. It definitely wasn't a 'plastic' burger like the one I had in Frankie and Benny's last year! I don't usually bother to eat the bacon in cheeseburgers as it's never cooked properly, but this bacon was cooked to perfection. Oh, and leeks in a burger taste really good. Who knew? I've had a lot of good burgers in my time, and this one was definitely in my top ten. 

I'll certainly be going back to the Urban Tap House as I thought the food was very reasonable and it was a nice relaxing place to spend a few hours on a Friday night. I've also seen a few photos of their mouth-watering specials on Twitter which make me want to hop in the car to town there and then!

Have you been to the Urban Tap House? What did you think?

Restaurant review: Frankie and Benny's

My first two experiences of eating at Frankie and Benny's weren't particularly positive. On the first occasion I ordered the Chicken Carbonara Bake which was way too creamy for my liking so I couldn't eat much of it. On the second occasion, I had a burger which was pretty good. However, I started to feel ill about 8 hours later and consequently spent all night throwing up. I think it's doubtful that the food actually made me ill as I ate half a packet of Pringles a couple of hours before I started feeling dodgy, but it did put me off going back to Frankie and Benny's for a while.

After visiting Frankie and Benny's a few weeks ago for the first time since the throwing up incident and having a lovely meal, myself and my boyfriend decided to go there for our anniversary meal. I live within walking distance of the Frankie and Benny's restaurant in Cardiff, so it's pretty convenient. They also provide a great specials menu from Sunday to Friday with 2 courses for £10.95 or 3 courses for £12.20. Considering that some of their main courses alone cost over £12, this is a bargain.

The specials menu is fairly limited compared to their full menu, but there's still plenty of choice for everyone in my humble opinion. There's actually too much choice for me, even though I have to steer well clear of anything which contains their philly cheese sauce. I also always avoid their Carbonara after my first negative experience of Frankie and Benny's. I chose the BBQ pulled pork potato skins for my starter, the BBQ Burger for my main and the Mint Choc Waffle for my dessert. 

BBQ pulled pork potato skins

I love potato skins at the best of times, and these definitely didn't disappoint. The skins were the perfect level of crispy, and the pork was tender and tasty. The cheese on top finished them off nicely, and the BBQ flavour was an excellent addition. Thumbs up for the starter!

BBQ Burger

As you can see, the burger was pretty big and smothered in BBQ sauce, salad and bacon. The burger itself was quite disappointing as the consistency wasn't great. It tasted processed and watery in parts, so I didn't eat the whole thing. However, the toasted sesame bun, bacon and BBQ sauce were lovely so I polished all those off. The chips were also delicious and just the way I like them, as I would expect in this type of restaurant. So apart from the burger itself, the main course also got a thumbs up.

Mint Choc Waffle

The dessert was definitely my highlight of the meal. The waffle was warm and flavoured with cinnamon, topped with mint chocolate chip ice cream, warm chocolate fudge sauce and chocolate honeycomb. The ice cream was good quality ice cream... I know good quality ice cream when I taste it, believe me. Although the chocolate fudge sauce was very rich, it had been used sparingly so that it didn't overpower the rest of the dessert. The chocolate honeycomb pieces were really tasty too and worked well with the mint choc chip ice cream. I would probably have chosen vanilla ice cream for this dessert if I had a choice,  but the mint choc chip really works. Massive round of applause for the dessert!

Frankie and Benny's has a nice family-friendly atmosphere, although it can be noisy at times when the staff sing happy birthday to the birthday guests in a T.G.I.Friday's style. They also don't sell refillable soft drinks, which is disappointing and fairly unusual for an American-style restaurant chain these days. However, on the whole, my latest experience at Frankie and Benny's was definitely a satisfying one. 

So, it's safe to say that my phobia of Frankie and Benny's has been eradicated after my two initial bad experiences. However, I won't be ordering a burger there again!

Has anyone else had as many 'hit' and 'miss' experiences at Frankie and Benny's as I have? Have you tried their bargain specials menu?

Happy 2nd anniversary!

It was mine and Neil's 2nd anniversary last week. Time flies! We celebrated on the Friday evening by going to Frankie and Benny's for a scrumptious three course dinner... look out for a separate blog post on that. We also did some shopping in Penarth, McArthur Glen (Bridgend) and Cardiff over the course of the weekend, had a coffee and hot chocolate in Costa, watched a lot of Inbetweeners and ate a calzone in Bella Italia on the Saturday evening. In case you didn't already know, we share a mutual love of food. I don't think I could actually be in a relationship with someone who didn't love food. Sad but true.

I wore my new dress for the occasion! I'm so pale...

We always buy each other little gifts and cards for our anniversaries, but we don't go too over the top. It's more about spending time together (and eating out) than about buying extravagant gifts. I bought a 'man tin' for Neil and filled it with nuts, chocolate and an Elmo air freshener for his car. These gifts might seem slightly random but they were inspired by some of our 'in' jokes! I also made him some chocolate brownies, which you can read about in an earlier blog post. 

Neil drew the short straw when it came to the timing of our anniversary as he only bought me my birthday gifts a few weeks ago. However, he still managed to buy me the perfect presents and I've used them several times already. 

Disney pyjamas and a massive Yankee candle!

I can confirm that I'm currently burning the Yankee candle in my living room and it smells goooood. Happy anniversary to me!